


Metamorphoses.

by Lanna Michaels (lannamichaels)



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: 2011 Bujold Fest, A Thousand Words, Gen, Second Chances, Starting Over, Time Period: Reign of Gregor Vorbarra, Time Period: Vorkosigan Regency
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-19
Updated: 2011-07-19
Packaged: 2017-10-21 13:47:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/225865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lannamichaels/pseuds/Lanna%20Michaels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time Allegre meets David, it's across an interrogation table.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Metamorphoses.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Philomytha](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Philomytha/gifts).
  * In response to a prompt by [Philomytha](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Philomytha/pseuds/Philomytha) in the [2011_bujold_fest](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/2011_bujold_fest) collection. 



> Written for [](http://www.archiveofourown.org/users/philomytha/profile)[**philomytha**](http://www.archiveofourown.org/users/philomytha/) 's [prompt](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/2011_bujold_fest/claims/22) in the [2011 Bujold Fest](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/2011_bujold_fest): _Anything set during the Komarr Revolt, either from the Barrayaran perspective or the Komarran._

The first time Allegre meets David, it's across an interrogation table. David is young, scared, and trembling. That's familiar. Too many kids come through here for this reason. He isn't the first one Allegre's done this to. He's not likely to be the last.

"Be sure," Allegre says.

David nods, looking everywhere but down. David's seen the bodies, but this is the final step. He finally settles his right hand down, covering half of the leftmost image. The worse half.

"This one is Nathan," he says. Then he moves his hand to the fifth image, the one that just has evidence scraps, nothing identifiable. Clothes. Tech. Paraphernalia. "My father. He-- this was his."

They couldn't get enough from the father to be sure, and Allegre notes that in the report. But the father was certainly present at the attack, and the son and the wife separately identified him from what remained. They don't hear from the older Galen again, so the file closes on the attacks on HQ Komarr and the Halomar Barracks, and David Galen ceases to be Allegre's concern.

When David -- _Duv_ he's calling himself these days, and he has the updated identification to prove it -- puts in for school on Barrayar, Allegre takes the case out of sheer curiosity. One of _those_ Galens, son of _that_ Galen, and now he wants to go to Barrayar although, even with the Barrayaran presence, the Komarran schools are still far superior. If they're ever going to make anything out of Komarr, like the Lord Regent wants, getting someone like David on their side would be a major victory. And not David, it's _Duv_ , David insists to the interrogators while under fast-penta with the kind of heat that both impresses Allegre and makes him wonder why David is trying to hide his past. He has to know it could never stay buried and that trying to bury it is suspicious.

"A new start," David says when he's back behind the interrogation table again, this time with his hands self-consciously folded in his lap. He's very tall for seventeen, very scrawny, and his boney elbows poke out. "There's nothing left on Komarr for me. I think-- I think I could make a difference. From the inside." Then he adds, very quietly, "this time."

David's already gone round and round with the ones who are supposed to make sure he's not some kind of sleeper agent, and Allegre doesn't think David has the cunning for that. That older brother had been a piece of work and might have been up to it, but David doesn't seem the type. That, of course, might just make him the more dangerous one.

"The inside," Allegre says.

David nods. He already has a provisional acceptance from Vorbarr Sultana University and another one from a university in Vorrutyer's District. His second choice, David had said, in case ImpSec wouldn't let him in Vorbarr Sultana.

In the fast-penta recordings that Allegre reviewed, David had been very repetitive about change from the inside. _Outside isn't going to accomplish anything_ , David had said, _it just gets you killed_ , and then the interrogator had correctly followed that line to David's issues with his father and his aunt and what he thinks about the current political climate, but had overlooked the substance of what David thinks he can actually accomplish from inside academia.

"You have to do, you can't just say," David says. "When you talk about these lofty goals, this-- all of this, and you don't do anything, the raving hypocrisy is pretty obvious. If you want integration, you've got to let us integrate, sir. And then people see that it works and it keeps working. If you keep talking about it and never let it happen, it's never going to happen."

"You want to be an example," Allegre leads.

"I think I'd be a good one," David says. "I'm already an example of what happens when your family picks wrong. And if I'm always going to be an example of something, I want to get to choose what I'm being used as an example of."

"And that is?" Allegre asks.

"Success," David says and shifts in the chair, clearly rethinking that choice of word. "I'm going to succeed, sir. It's going to work. It's a good plan, the Lord Regent's. I want to be part of it. You can point to me in ten years, say I'm your tame Komarran pet, and it'll be true. And I _want_ that, sir. I want this. I won't fight. You want me for what I represent; I want you for your opportunities. It'll work. You've got to give me a chance, sir. Give me enough rope to hang myself or swing for shore, and I promise I'll land on both feet and hold the rope for others to follow. You can trust me. I'm good for it. I've got nothing else but hope, sir. I've been-- I've been working on this for years. This is all I have. Look me up again in ten years, sir, and I'll look you in the eye and if I haven't done anything, you can throw me down some cell and never let me out. Just let me try, sir, and I'll do it. But you gotta let me try."

Allegre nods thoughtfully and David leans forward and keeps going and manages to convince him and, ten years later, Allegre finds himself writing a security report because Duv has applied for the Imperial Service Academy and Simon Illyan thinks this is the stupidest thing he's ever heard.

"He might be stupid, but he's sincere," Allegre concludes in that report and Duv sends him a letter thanking him after he's accepted, and ten years after, Duv gets dumped on his doorstep, his father now _actually_ dead.

Allegre gives him an analyst post and a pat on the shoulder and Duv whispers, "okay, so maybe not the tame part," as an apology, and, together, they bury David in Duv's past.


End file.
